Ghost Rider

[MacGuffin]

Hairpiece of Vengeance
First official Ghost Rider pic.



USA Today has posted the first official still photo of Oscar-winner Nicolas Cage as doomed biker Johnny Blaze, the human alter ego of Ghost Rider. The photo reveals that Cage wears a rather noticeable toupee as Johnny.

The newspaper spoke with Ghost Rider director Mark Steven Johnson about Cage's fondness for comic books and his famous tatoo of a certain flaming-skulled Marvel anti-hero. "The irony is we had to remove Nic's Ghost Rider so he could play Ghost Rider," Johnson said.

The Columbia/Marvel Studios pic is filming in Australia for a 2006 release.

[pete]

look at nic cage doing his best keanu reeves.
ah, the joy of bureaucratic filmmaking.

[UncleJoey]

I hope it turns out that's just a picture of him at a drive-thru window after they gave him regular Coke instead of diet.

[MacGuffin]

Release Date: August 6th, 2006 (wide)

Cast: Nicolas Cage (Johnny Blaze/Ghost Rider), Eva Mendes (Roxanne Simpson), Wes Bentley (Blackheart), Sam Elliott, Peter Fonda (Mephistopheles), Donal Logue (Mack), Daniel Frederiksen (Wallow), Matt Long (Young Johnny Blaze)

Director: Mark Steven Johnson (Daredevil, Simon Birch)

Screenwriter: Shane Salerno (cowriter of Alien vs Predator); rewrite by Mark Steven Johnson (Daredevil, Simon Birch, Big Bully, Grumpy Old Men). David S. Goyer (Blade, The Crow: City of Angels, Kickboxer 2: The Road Back, Blade 2) wrote a draft, but it appears that Sony's starting from scratch with Shane Salerno.

Based Upon: The character of the same name published by Marvel Comics which was first seen in Marvel Spotlight #5 in 1972. There have been two long-running Ghost Rider series. The first ran from 1973 to 1983, featuring the character of Johnny Blaze who will be seen in this movie. The second series, running from 1990-1998 featured a new host, Danny Ketch.

Premise: This is the story of motorcycle stunt performer, Johnny Blaze (Cage), who agrees to become the host of a "spirit of vengeance" in exchange for the safety of his true love (Mendes), but the price he pays is to be cursed with the avenging spirit that takes its form at night as a demon with a flaming skull on a motorcycle of hellfire. His newfound power is tested when he finds himself in conflict with Blackheart (Bentley), a member of Hell's royal family who intends to claim it all for himself.

The premise is a loose translation of what one of the early scripts was about, and what the press release said. Something that's worth noting however, is that the "spirit" differs from the comic books. Johnny Blaze was possessed by the demon Zarathos in the comics, while it was the later Danny Ketch who was possessed by the "avenging spirit."

[Gamblour.]

"Oh you directed Daredevil and Simon Birch, a movie so bad that John Irving didn't want his book, A Prayer for Owen Meaney, to be associated with it, so he forced you to change the title? Well come on aboard! We'd love to hire a director with your credentials!"

I just don't get it.

[matt35mm]

"Oh you directed Daredevil and Simon Birch, a movie so bad that John Irving didn't want his book, A Prayer for Owen Meaney, to be associated with it, so he forced you to change the title? Well come on aboard! We'd love to hire a director with your credentials!"

I just don't get it.

Well, I don't think that this is a movie that the studio actually wants to be good.  They just want it to be popular.  And it's all part of the vicious cycle of the studio deciding what is mainstream based on the audience that follows what a studio produces as mainstream which are both contributing to the downward-spinning spiral regarding the quality of the mainstream movie.  The studio deliberately makes stupid movies to please the audience that they believe is stupid, the audience laps it up because they are stupid, and the reason that they're stupid is because they were raised on stupid movies that the studio produced based on the belief that their audience was stupid.

[pete]

that whole stupid cycle thing was really articulate and beautiful.  it's just what I need right now actually.  thank you.

[Sleuth]

Why am I the only one who's always fooled by wigs

[MacGuffin]

On-Set Interview: Mark Steven Johnson
We talk to the writer-director on the set of the Marvel comic adaptation Ghost Rider!

Fans of 2003's Daredevil are immediately familiar with the name Mark Steven Johnson. He is, after all, the guy who brought that character to life, and later made it possible for supporting player Jennifer Garner to become an action heroine in her own right as Elektra earlier this year. But 2006 promises to be the year of Ghost Rider, and Johnson returns to comic book territory swinging the heavy lumber; enlisting Nicolas Cage, Peter Fonda and Eva Mendes for the forthcoming adaptation.

Johnson developed the project from its origins as a script by Blade scribe David S. Goyer and combined the disparate comic narratives into one dynamic and dramatically compelling action-adventure. Johnson recently spoke to IGN FilmForce about the film, which he describes as a combination of classic westerns and harrowing Hammer horror, and explained how he came to call upon one of America's greatest actors for Ghost Rider's fantasy made flesh.

Q: What sort of lessons did you learn working on Darevdevil and its theatrical-versus-DVD cuts that made this film easier to assemble for a theatrical release?

MARK STEVEN JOHNSON: It was an interesting experience because with Daredevil, we cut like half an hour out of the movie and the director's cut, which I do like a lot more than the theatrical version. It still has its flaws, of course, but I think it is a more complete version of the movie, and when I was working on [Ghost Rider] I wanted to make sure the same thing would happen. Luckily, Sony has had so much success with Spider-Man and with Marvel characters that I haven't had that problem, you know what I mean? There was never like, 'this is the part of the movie that's going to go' – there was no fighting over certain parts of the film that you sometimes get into. So I felt much more relieved about the fact that everything that I've written is going to be on screen and if anything was really debatable or if we didn't see eye-to-eye on things, we'll deal with it beforehand. Because ultimately a director's cut, I do think, is a much better film, but there's still battles you're not going to win, there's still things you'll never get, there's still short cuts you have to take because it's still not what you envisioned and that's the hardest thing of all – especially when you spend much of your life on something.  

Q: Can you talk about what changed between your version of the film and David S. Goyer's after you joined the project?

JOHNSON: It's really a different script. The original script that David did is a totally different story and then Shane Salerno would come on and he did his own different story, and then I did my own. It's one of those things that there is no right or wrong to it, just like anybody will do your version, its going to be your version. David just chose a different story and I really liked it, [but] it just isn't the story that I was going to tell, so they are really completely different screenplays. I really like David's writing a lot though. I'm a big fan of him.

Q: How much of the script has changed since shooting began?

JOHNSON: The script is always in flux – I'm always making changes. It's changed the least of anything I've ever worked on, which is great. It was a tough one to crack up front, but once I felt like I did then it all flowed really nicely. What was really hard was just the concept up front, which is very rare. Usually the concept is the strongest part of the comic, and in this one the idea is great, the character is amazing and there's some great story lines, but... the fact that the devil made a deal with Johnny and gave him all these powers and Johnny took those powers to go fight the devil never quite added up. And everybody over the years kept trying to solve that and change that, so it's kind of actually a faulty concept in a weird way, and that's something that took me many months to finally crack it. And I came up with the idea of [Ghost Rider being] the devil's bounty hunter, that there are rules [for] heaven and hell on earth. The idea is that Mephistopheles has to find the best rider in the world to become his Ghost Rider. That made sense to me, he has to give him this power because he works for him. Then I got it – then everything from there flowed – but at first it was tough.

Q: What's the toughest part of translating comic books, and in particular Ghost Rider comic books, to the big screen?

JOHNSON: For this one, the visuals, because this is one of those you couldn't have made even a couple of years ago. Fire is a really tough thing on CG, and the skull and everything; it's just one of those that if it would've been done on prosthetics it would've been I think horrible. I'm a big fan of doing things real but this is one of those where you can't. When it came time to the movie that was the first thing, can we make the Ghost Rider? Will he look cool? Once Sony Imageworks did some tests we realized we can really do it.

Q: Do you feel any pressure following up Spider-Man at Sony after the series' unprecedented success?

JOHNSON: There's ton of pressure, but not because of that (laughs). They're so different. I hate it when people lump it all together as comic book movies because they're so different – they're apples and oranges. This is not a guy putting on a costume. I was much more concerned with Daredevil because Spider-Man had just come out and it was a huge hit and Daredevil was not known and Spider-Man is known all over the world. They both were red, they both jump out of buildings there was a lot of 'how are we going to distinguish ourselves?' [Ghost Rider] is more of a monster movie in a way – it's more of a classic kind of monster movie more than it is a superhero, it just happens to come from a comic book.

Q: Do you have any trepidations about the possibility of being pigeonholed as a 'comic book director'?

JOHNSON: I don't care (laughs). I'll be happy just doing comic book movies.

Q: Did you research the character a lot before starting the project, or were you familiar with Ghost Rider already?

JOHNSON: I've been reading Ghost Rider, Daredevil, all of these comics since I was a little kid. I literally learned to read by reading comics. This has been seven or eight years in the making.

Q: Comic book adaptations have been exceedingly popular lately. Do you worry at all that they may become less so in the future, or that they will fall out of fashion?

JOHNSON: I don't. Again, because I think if you really want to look at it American Splendor is a comic book movie, Road to Perdition is a comic book movie, and they couldn't be more different from this or from Spider-Man or any of those. I just think, again, some stories are better told graphically, but I think that it is true anytime someone is going to put a costume or have an alter ego then you're in a certain territory a very specific territory where things certainly blend in together.

Q: Other collaborators mentioned this film is heavily influenced by Westerns.

JOHNSON: Yeah, totally. There's been really two versions of the Danny Ketch and the Johnny Blaze story lines in the comics. Danny, I know, was [set in] New York, and I had to make a choice of setting it in New York City or setting it somewhere else – and again trying to diverse yourself from all the other comic book movies, Hell's Kitchen [with Daredevil] or Spider-Man and all these other movies that are in New York City. That was a great opportunity to say, 'we'll take it out and make something really different'. I always wanted to make a western and because of the rider I just thought it was a great opportunity, so the idea was to come up with a supernatural western, which I've never seen. I thought it was a cool idea. So it took me away from New York City, it took me away from the superhero vibe and just take it out into the deserts and take it to Texas. And we don't even name the city – we never say Dallas or Houston or anything like that. We just say it's a big city in Texas and we make it a cowboy movie; in a way, we make it a real western – it's like a Sergio Leone movie with a Hammer [horror] film, is what I keep thinking (laughs). If you slam them together you say, 'that's pretty cool – I'd see that.' That's really different, and Nic (Cage) and I will always laugh about it cause we always do things at the end of the day and say, "What do we do different." What's really different about it even if it's not good. (Laughs) And we don't use it but at least we tried something, but that is the vibe of the movie. It does feel that way it has this kind of darkness but also this kind of really…it feels like a painting a lot of times. It looks like a comic book panel in the best sense of the word I think, its got that feel to it.

Q: How intense is the action in Ghost Rider?

JOHNSON: There is a lot of intensity and there is violence. It's not a splatter movie, and I'm not demeaning that cause I like them a lot, but it's not a movie where we're going to see how much gore we can put into the film. That's not what its about. The themes are inherently dark – selling your soul to the devil, fighting demons – and all this kind of stuff is inherently dark, but that's also balanced. There is some humor to the movie, there is a love story in the movie, and hopefully we'll have both.

[03]

JOHNSON: Yeah, totally.

ukkk

[meatball]

Wanted: Dead or Unemployed

Mark Steven Johnson, responsible for:
Daredevil
Elektra
Ghost Rider

Paul W.S. Anderson, responsible for:
Soldier
Resident Evil
Alien Vs. Predator

David S. Goyer, responsible for:
Blade
Blade II
Blade: Trinity

Tim Story, responsible for:
Taxi
Fantastic Four

[Ghostboy]

One of those is not like the others.

[Pozer]

yeah, but still.

[Pubrick]

Wanted: Dead or Unemployed

Mark Steven Johnson, responsible for:
Daredevil
Elektra
Ghost Rider

Paul W.S. Anderson, responsible for:
Soldier
Resident Evil
Alien Vs. Predator

David S. Goyer, responsible for:
Blade
Blade II
Blade: Trinity

Tim Story, responsible for:
Taxi
Fantastic Four

this should be a thread.

[MacGuffin]

On-Set Interview Part II: Mark Steven Johnson
More with the writer-director of Ghost Rider.

Howdy, Ghost readers! In part one of our interview with Ghost Rider writer-director Mark Steven Johnson, the filmmaker discussed the history of his latest project, the prospect of returning to comic book territory after Daredevil, and the filmmaking foundations of the upcoming adaptation.

Here, in part two, Johnson discusses his cast and crew, specifically Nicolas Cage and Eva Mendes, who play Ghost Rider and gal pal Roxanne.

Q: Mark, what made Nicolas Cage the right actor for this role? What do you feel he brought to the character that wasn't already in the script?

MARK STEVEN JOHNSON: What's so cool about Nic [is] probably knowing how much he loves this character – he's been wanting to make this movie for a long time. It was one of those where again [you are] trying to divorce yourself from other movies, or other movies in this genre. I like the fact that [Ghost Rider is] a man, I like that he's not a teenager or he's not a kid who is learning about adulthood and all that of stuff. I like that fact that he's a man, and I like the fact that he's kind of our "Man With No Name" in a way – you have him very weathered, very tan, very lean, very hungry looking. I think it's actually more poignant that this is a guy who makes a deal in the movie as a kid, and knowing that the devil may show up, come knocking and say, "Okay, its time – I need you," and what's happened to him in those years. He now has become this kind of haunted guy, [and] I think it's a really interesting way to go.

What he brought to it is... he's Nic! There's a lot of my faults in some of the writing; I had certain clichéd things like hard-drinking, smoking kind of death-wish, Evel Knievel-type of guy. What's good about Nic is that he'll always say, "I can't relate to a guy like that what if he did this, what if he did that." It's always more interesting. Nic would always do things like [where] there's this scene in the locker room and he's about to go out and Nic's like "you know, I've always wanted to drink a whole hot pot of coffee when I'm really nervous in a scene." I'm like, "cool – let's try it," and he'll grab a pot of coffee and drink it. It's just things that only Nic can get away with; no one else can get away with it. It's actually funny and it's kind of cool or the way he would play a transformation scene and what that would feel like, he's so intense. One thing you have to say about Nic he does everything 100% – he never goes half way. He goes for it. So these scenes where he's changing and screaming, it's difficult to watch because he commits himself so wholly to the role. That's the biggest thing, the level of commitment – he doesn't give a s**t what he looks like, doesn't care, doesn't worry about vanity, none of that. He just goes for it and commits himself to it.

Q: What prompted you to choose Eva Mendes for Roxanne?

JOHNSON: I just think that she's really full of a lot of life and a lot of light. The movie can be dark and you need to balance it, and there's something about her that makes you like her and root for her throughout all of this. Because I set it in Texas, I thought it would be nice to have a Latina to open it up and make it more real – be more specific to that part of the country. I liked her and Nic together, I thought they were interesting, they were extremely different looking and I thought that was a more interesting combination than blonde hair and blue eyes like Roxanne [is drawn] in the comic.

Q: How faithful is the movie to the comic, particularly given its numerous incarnations and series?

JOHNSON: The movie is extremely faithful to the comic, but the one thing I did was I took, I hope, the best of Johnny Blaze and Danny Ketch, because even though I like the Johnny Blaze stuff for me, I like the artwork and some of the villains and stuff that came out of the Danny Ketch era of the comic. So I was able to take Johnny Blaze, stunt driver, all the stuff that I use to love as a kid, but the villain is Blackheart, which is the Danny Ketch villain, [and] Caretaker is a Danny Ketch character. So I got to take my favorites from both.

Q: How much did you read comic books while you were growing up?

JOHNSON: I was always the kid waiting outside the drugstore (laughs). We didn't have a comic book shop in my town – it was really small – but we had a drugstore and they'd come deliver them in big bundles and I would always waited outside on the days they would show up.

Q: You seem to have an affinity for Marvel Comics. Were those predominantly the ones you read?

JOHNSON: [I read] all of them. It's where all my allowance money went – all my money. Not a lot of DC [Comics] and I'm not just saying that, swear to God (laughs). For some reason I couldn't get into them. Only over the last couple of years I started reading more independent comics; I came to that kind of late, to be honest – it just was Marvel forever. But now I'm reading more stuff, Vertigo stuff and things like that.

Q: The producers said that they want the film to portray a "real story." How tough is that to do with a character whose head is a flaming skull?

JOHNSON: It's hard. That's always the kind of balancing act that we have to face all the time. There's actually some real heartfelt moments in the piece. There are some moments where you go from the surreal and then extremely intense, frightening violent moments to really Beauty and the Beast kind of moments, or just the haunted man who's made a mistake and just has to pay for it everyday of his life. It's a real juggling act, [and] it's Nic who really sells it. Nic could really sell it, and he does, and not many people could get away with that, quite frankly. It's great for me; it makes my job so much easier.

Q: In Daredevil you threw in some visual references to John Romita and certain people who had things to do with the comic. Are you doing that with this character as well?

JOHNSON: Yup, but I'm not going to tell you who they are (laughs).

Q: How difficult or easy was it for you to maintain a balance between creating a faithful comic adaptation and simply telling a compelling story?

JOHNSON: To be honest, it's a little easier on this one. For Daredevil, you've got the Frank Miller era and you've got these legendary story lines; it's more like how am I going to combine them all, how am I going to cherry-pick all my favorite stuff? Or, if you get stuck, you can always go to the comic and say "of course I'm going to use this" – it was a luxury. This one you don't have that as much; I mean, you can't buy Ghost Rider right now in the comic shop. It doesn't exist, and I know they are bringing it back, thank God, but that makes it more difficult because there are some great stories but there's not like the perfect, epic story line [or] the classic golden era of Ghost Rider. It was more just a fantastic character and a fantastic concept, so in a way that also frees me, because it gives you more leeway. You realize that this is something fantastic but it's also something that's maybe not been handled as well as it could have been. It should still be out there and it's not, so that gives me freedom. Usually you just try to make it as good as the comics, [but] maybe you could actually improve it and make it better, hopefully. That's what you hope for anyway.